NYC Council Bill Talks Rooftop Turbines

The New York City Council passed a bill Monday (April 23) that would standardize the installation of wind turbines on rooftops, which is part of a larger move to reduce the city’s carbon emissions by 80 percent between 2014 and 2050.

"As anyone who's dealt with [the department] knows, even the most garden-variety projects can often ensnare you in endless strands of red tape," said Queens Democrat Councilman Costa Constantinides, who is also the sponsor of the bill. "When you add cutting-edge technology on top of that, you're only complicating it further."

The New York City Council passed a bill Monday (April 23) that would standardize the installation of wind turbines on rooftops, which is part of a larger move to reduce the city’s carbon emissions by 80 percent between 2014 and 2050.

The legislation standardizes the process of wind turbine installation so that parameters remain clear for property owners, and inspectors know what specific criteria to follow.

A similar proposal, passed in the same meeting and also sponsored by Constantinides, is geared toward the development of a wind map that would show where these turbines would function best.

According to Crain’s, even though solar panels tend to make for more cost-effective small-scale power generators, they are not a viable option for all of the rooftops in the city. This opens the way for wind energy.

Installing wind turbines and solar panels are in line with the goal of reducing the city’s carbon emissions, but the big contender remains reducing the power of consumption of buildings, which accounts for three-quarters of NYC’s greenhouse-gas emissions. In this vein, City Council Speaker Corey Johnson proposed a bill would require that all city-owned buildings be powered by green energy by 2050, which was also passed in the same meeting.